Who and in what circumstances can we assist?

We provide services in a wide variety of situations, but all focused on preserving and giving access to records over the long term. These include:

Where there is a legal requirement to retain business/organisation records over a particular time period in an authentic and accessible form
Where there is a need to have records retain evidentiary integrity
Where there is a desire to eliminate storage costs of paper records
Where access to records is desired quickly from any location
Where a paper archive is to be digitised and published to the web
Where high degrees of authenticity and integrity are not necessarily required, but the organisation just wants accessibility and/or to eliminate paper storage costs
Where the organisation wants to turn untapped records/publications into an accessible resource
Where sophisticated retrieval of individual records is required.
Where “born” digital records/documents/emails etc. are not currently in a permanently accessible long term format.

We can also assist with “refreshing” and “migrating”.

These terms have specific meanings.

“Refreshing” refers to updating digital content held on old, deteriorating or obsolete media. For example, files may be currently preserved on floppy discs. The files can be relocated onto new media such as CDs, DVDs or hard discs. The files themselves are preserved in the same form.

“Migrating” refers to updating digital content currently held in an obsolete digital format. For example, files may be in formats which are, or will be in the near future, difficult or impossible to open, or if opened in current software versions, may lose original characteristics. Files such as WordStar, early WordPerfect, PaperPort (.max format), and even files created by early versions of Word and Excel may now be difficult to access. Vendors of proprietary software applications are primarily concerned with selling ever changing versions of software, not with long term record preservation.

In many circumstances a combination of both refreshing and migrating may be required.

Who can we assist?

Virtually any company, firm, association or other body whose organisational memory is preserved in documents.

The principles of long term preservation are the same irrespective of the type of organisation. The method of preservation will however vary considerably.